Category: Food

It’s a myth that dates back decades: eat a hearty breakfast, a decent-sized lunch, and a large dinner, and avoid snacks and desserts. But will eating like this day after day really keep the pounds off? It sounds ludicrous and always will, but eating six meals a day, not three, will actually help you lose weight, as well as feel better!

Here are some recommended meals throughout a day to help you keep the weight off…

Meal #1: Breakfast

No matter what time of day you have it, breakfast is an essential start to your day. But instead of going for the pancakes and high fructose corn syrup (aka artificial maple syrup), eat a small portion of eggs and toast, or a protein shake.

Meal #2: Morning Mid-Meal

A couple hours before lunch, take a quick minute and have a snack. But a snack doesn’t mean a bag of chips. A perfect snack is an apple and a slice of cheese, or a handful of blueberries with cottage cheese, or a nutrition bar.

Meal #3: Lunch

Don’t go crazy on lunch and load up on burgers, fries, and chocolate milkshakes. Have a little bit more than you would in a mid-meal, but don’t go overboard. A sensible lunch is a turkey or ham sandwich with a handful of grapes. If you must have a small handful of chips, go with a more natural kind.

Meal #4: Afternoon Mid-Meal

This might be the most important mid-meal of the day, as taking a minute to eat a healthy snack in the late afternoon will help get you all the way to dinner without that dangerous coma we all enter around 4 o’clock. Try a banana with peanut butter at this point of the day, or raspberries with cottage cheese.

Meal #5: Dinner

This can be the biggest meal of the day, but again, don’t go overboard with the portions. A sensible dinner would be teriyaki chicken with generous portions of rice or steamed broccoli. Another great idea is a turkey burger with sides of sweet potato fries and sliced cantaloupe.

Meal #6: Dessert

That’s right. To lose weight you must eat dessert! Now don’t think of dessert as your favorite ice cream covered in microwave heated chocolate sauce. A great dessert is a health shake, or your favorite pudding mixed in with some protein powder. But the easiest, and most delicious, dessert to make is a dish with bananas and cottage cheese, covered with warm all-natural maple syrup.

Eat six nutritious meals a day, and you will be on your way to looking, and feeling, your best.

We’ve all been there. It’s late at night, you’re about thirty minutes or an hour away from going to bed, but you want one more little bite to eat to please your sweet tooth.

If you want a quick and delicious dessert that is surprisingly really good for you, break off a piece of 70% organic dark chocolate, and enjoy! But if you want to make a dessert that you won’t regret having eaten the morning after? Here’s an easy, painless recipe that will fill your stomach with a good mix of protein and carbs, as well as pure deliciousness!

Bananas Foster Style is a divine little dessert that is perfect for a late night snack / dessert. You get some fruit, a little protein, and a sweet, sumptuous glaze of maple syrup. You’ll only need four ingredients, as well as a frying pan!

Bananas Foster Style Ingredients

1 Ripe Organic Banana

½ Cup Organic Low Fat Cottage Cheese

2 Tablespoons Organic Grade B 100% Natural Maple Syrup

Splash of Organic Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Start by heating up your frying pan and sprinkling in it a small amount of Organic Extra Virgin Olive Oil. (You can also use a tiny amount of Organic Butter if you prefer.) Keep the burner at a medium setting.

Next, take your banana and slice it to the end. You should have ten to fifteen slices of banana by the time you’re done. If you’re really hungry, you can use two bananas, but one banana is typically enough.

Spread the slices of banana around the frying pan so each slice has its own section — don’t stack any slices on top of each other. Keep the burner on a medium setting and let the slices of banana sizzle on the pan for one minute.

Next, pour the two tablespoons of maple syrup on top of the banana slices, making sure each slice has a small amount of syrup surrounding it. Let the slices sizzle in the syrup for another minute. Next, each banana slice over and let the other size of each slice sizzle with the syrup in the pan.

Next take a half cup of organic low fat cottage cheese and place it in the center of a small plate. You can heat the cottage cheese in the microwave if you prefer, but it’s not required. Next, brush the banana slices off the pan to the top of the cottage cheese on the plate. Serve immediately.

Voila! A quick, easy healthy dessert option that will please any member of your family.

Nothing is better than a moist, delectable chocolate chip cookie. There are thousands of recipes out there, many of which use healthy substitutes for the butter, and others that add nuts and oats and all sorts of unnecessary goodies. Truly the best chocolate chip cookies are the ones with the least amount of ingredients and the least amount of hassle. This is a super easy recipe to make, one that you can even get your children involved in!

If you’re simply looking to bake classic chocolate chip cookies, look no further than this divine recipe. Here are the ingredients and steps to put together a plate of goodies your whole family will be devouring in no time.

Best Chocolate Chip Cookies Recipe

2 Cups All-Purpose Flour

1 Tsp Baking Soda

1 Tsp Cinnamon

1 Pinch Salt

2 Large Eggs

1 Cup Butter

½ Cup White Sugar

½ Cup Brown Sugar

1 Tsp Vanilla Extract

12 oz Bag Chocolate Chips

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F.

A Dash of Cinnamon Gives These Cookies Some Spice

Start with the dry ingredients. Get a wire whisk. Combine the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt in a small bowl. Set aside.

Get an electric mixer with this next part. In a larger bowl, add the butter and mix it in with the white sugar and brown sugar. Don’t overmix, but be sure to get rid of all the clumps. Add the vanilla extract and continue mixing.

The Trick is to Not Overmix the Ingredients

Next, add the eggs, one at a time. Be sure to beat each egg well into the mix.

Once the mix is creamy and looks ready, take the small bowl of dry ingredients and add it to the large bowl of wet ingredients. Don’t add all the dry ingredients at once. Add one third of a time, beating it in with the wet ingredients.

Add a Cup of Your Favorite Chocolate Chips

Put the electric mixer aside; you won’t need it for this last part. Take a 12 oz bag of any chocolate chips of your choosing and dump all of its contents into the mix. Don’t mix the chocolate chips in with a wire whisk or the electric mixer; use a spoon. Blend slowly and thoroughly.

Add spoonfuls of the dough onto ungreased cookie sheets. Bake for ten to twelve minutes or until brown. Cool on cookie sheets for three to five minutes before serving,

Thanksgiving dinner offers some of the year’s most delicious, filling food all on one crazy night. There are a dozen or more standard dishes served on any given Thanksgiving night, but what are the five essentials?

Here are some obvious choices, and a couple not so obvious….

Turkey with Gravy

Yeah, that one’s a little obvious. But what’s Thanksgiving without the turkey? Nothing beats three thick slices of turkey on the left side of the dining room table plate, with the tender meat doused with steaming hot gravy. The best thing about turkey at Thanksgiving: it makes great sandwiches for the next week!

Stuffing

The favorite dish for many, this one’s usually the side to make you anticipate the holiday all year long. The delectable mixture of onion, celery, bread cubes, seasoning, spices, and chicken broth makes the taste buds go wild. This also goes down well with a spoonful of cranberry sauce accompanying it.

Sweet Potato Casserole

Everybody loves French fries, but the world’s not-so-hidden secret is the even better sweet potato fries. Anything sweet potato is likely to be amazing, and the Thanksgiving sweet potato casseroles should most certainly be a family staple. With endless recipe possibilities online, this dish can be re-worked and experimented with every November. Just don’t forget the sweet potatoes!

Ambrosia

This is the scariest Thanksgiving dish to try as a child. It’s the one that looks the most like multi-colored vomit chunks. But once you get past the look and overall gloopiness of the dish, it makes for a belly-warming addition to the already completely full dining room plate. The sweet blending of mandarin oranges, pineapple chunks, coconut, sour cream, and miniature marshmallows goes far too well with every other side dish.

Pumpkin Cheesecake

The most variations at Thanksgiving dinner come in the dessert options. The staple is pumpkin pie, but is that really the best you can do? Even pumpkin lovers have to admit that pumpkin pie is one of the more bland pumpkin desserts out there. Apple pie is always a winner, as are other fruit pies. But the very best dessert has to be the integration of pumpkin and cheesecake. There are a lot of great recipes online, but Pumpkin Marble Cheesecake is the great champion, blending half regular cheesecake with pumpkin cheesecake, all baked on top of a pecan crust. Your whole family will go crazy for this scrumptious finish to their Thanksgiving dinner.

Los Angeles can be intimidating to those not entirely familiar with the area, especially when it comes to finding a good place to eat.

Below are five great Los Angeles restaurant staples that will fill you with delicious food and at the same time not put a huge dent in your wallet, and were always my five favorites to hit up when I lived in L.A.!

5. More Than Waffles in Encino

Nothing warms the heart more than a plate of warm waffles just like grandma used to make. Looking for a great breakfast in LA? Look no further than this hidden treasure in Encino. The menu is big with breakfast and lunch options, but order one of the omelettes. They’re big enough to share, plus you get a crisp waffle on the side!

4. The Nosh in Beverly Hills

It’s hard enough to find parking in Beverly Hills, let alone a decent place to eat. Once you get tired of eating those famous Sprinkles cupcakes for lunch every day, mosey down a couple blocks to an awesome restaurant called The Nosh. While the menu is even bigger than the one at More Than Waffles, you really can’t go wrong with any of the choices here. The restaurant might be most popular for the bagel combinations, but their Rueben sandwich is out of this world.

3. Aroma Coffee & Tea in Studio City

Prepared for huge crowds and sandwiches that might be a little bit on the pricier side, but the ambience, huge portions, and endless tasty dishes make this charming restaurant a can’t-miss. The menu includes excellent breakfast, lunch, and dinner options, including incredible wraps, giant salads, and insanely delectable pancakes. Once you get to the front of the line, which stretches out the door no matter what day or time you go, you can also pick from dozens of dessert options, which range from cookies, cheesecakes, and pies.

2. Roscoe’s House of Chicken & Waffles in Hollywood

This might sound gross to you. You might want to dine on a huge platter of fried chicken and giant waffles dripping with butter and maple syrup. But you really haven’t tasted the best of LA until trying this incomparable platter of heart-stopping goodness. Don’t miss out — order the #3, Herb’s Special, which offers half a southern style chicken and two waffles. You might not be able to eat anything else for the rest of the day, but you will delight in every last bite of this plate of pure food magic.

1. The Apple Pan in West LA

The one, the only. For the best burger, fries, and pie in L.A., look no further than this old-school institution located across the street from the Landmark Theaters. Parking can be a nightmare, trying to find a couple seats takes both patience and tenacity, but every second waiting for this heavenly food is worth it. Start with the Hickoryburger, with melted cheese, and be sure to include the French fries, well done for extra crispiness. Next — and it is imperative that you don’t leave this restaurant, one that hasn’t really changed its menu since 1947, before trying this slice of heaven — order the banana cream pie. You might be inclined to order the apple pie given the place’s name, but it doesn’t even compare to the orgasmic combination of bananas, custard, and so-good-you’ll-want-to-die buttery crust.